Laura Jane Williams on why Queer Eye is the feminist show to watch right now

'These men are our allies'

Have you seen Queer Eye yet? If you haven’t sobbed and laughed through the eight-part Netflix series streaming now, you’ve probably heard people talking about it who have. It is brilliant, and every hyperbolic Tweet is warranted. It is, I think, the most feminist show on TV.

How can a show about men be feminist? you might ask. Well. I have a theory.

Queer Eye is a makeover show. Clothes, food, home décor, culture and grooming are addressed by “The Fab Five” – who yes, are five gay men with style, but also charm. And good manners. And empathy by the bucket load. And they are here to make men of all colours, creeds, sizes, sexualities and classes across Georgia, America, know that they are worthy of carrying themselves with that same grace.

That’s the focus of the show: worthiness. Because so many of the men featured do not believe, in one way or another, that they are worthy. And the short answer on why is this: toxic masculinity.

The men featured are all defined by adherence to traditional male gender roles that restrict the emotions they display and limit their emotional range. We all know men like that: blokes who won’t wear pink or eat quiche or do the washing up because “that’s for women, innit?” (Yawn.) Or, men in an incredible amount of pain because they feel weak for crying and so become aggressive, because that is more acceptable, or men who think they are inadequate-looking and so “less” of a man because they’re not “hot”. These men don’t even try and then make out like anyone who does is “girly” or “camp”.

Most of the men featured in the show have fathers who have passed or who are absent, and don’t have healthy male role models in their life. I don’t think that is a coincidence. In sashay Jonathan, Kamaro, Antoni, Tan and Bobby, then, to demonstrate what “being a man” really looks like. And spoiler alert: it looks a lot like what being a woman does. Which is to say: it's simply being human.

There is fashion, there are feelings, and there is a heck of a lot of self-love.

The show’s hosts never chastise or belittle their makeover subject. Not once is weight mentioned. Nobody is “undateable” or “ugly” - everyone has missed romantic opportunities because they haven’t understood their value, or because they must to stand taller and be more in tune themselves and state their needs. The Fab Five let it be known: it is okay to have these needs.

Where else on television are men being told that?

There isn't a single demonstration of bitchiness in nearly eight hours of television and it is the most heartening display of peer accountability I’ve known: Jonathan says something flippant about a man they haven’t even met yet, and the other four tell him what he is saying is unacceptable. And Jonathan concedes! And then apologises! And then they all move on! Would that the straight men of the world take note.

Queer Eye is a makeover show, yes, but it is so much more than that. In a world where the feminist fight still isn’t over, what we need is men who are our allies – and these men are our allies.

If men listen only to other men, the Fab Five are the ultimate male feminists because they’re Trojan horses. They’re feminists in disguise, accepted by men in pain as one of their own to espouse the values of self-care, kindness, and humour, making these men nicer to themselves – and in turn their wider world.

Queer Eye uses gay men to unleash traditionally feminine qualities in masculine blokes to redefine what all of those things even mean.

Queer Eye is a show about men guiding men to be their best selves. It’s a show about taking yourself seriously, and acting with respect. It is about encouragement, and everything is about “stepping up” and “elevating”. Being uplifted. It is about words: using words to claim feelings, so that these men might let themselves heal. And only when men are as absolved from the patriarchal bullshit that separates “men” from “women” will feminism need no longer exist.

And the conversations this show provokes are one hell of a leap in that direction. So watch it.

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